10 Most Common Symptoms Of Porn Addiction

One of the most troubling times in some men’s lives is the moment they realize the toll pornography was taking on their well being. Personally, I quit pornography at a time when the resources available today were non existent and identifying all the symptoms of my addiction took many years.

Today, there are hundreds of resources out there that will educated you on possible porn addiction symptoms, but as a man who sadly spend almost half his life addicted to porn, I’ve experienced literally all of them. This post is my attempt to help those of you who are still not sure of your relationship with porn.

If you are not sure whether you are dealing with a bad porn habit or a full blown addiction, going through these 10 symptoms will help you figure out how deep you currently are. Symptoms on their own do not necessarily mean that you are addicted to porn, but experiencing several of those listed below should be a source of serious concern for you.

Understanding all the symptoms of your porn addiction is crucial to quitting.

1) Loss of Concentration:

Personally, this was the most debilitating effect of porn addiction for me. If you’ve been experiencing an acute inability to focus on a task for long periods of time, increased “ADHD” symptoms and zoning out constantly especially when you never experienced them at this level of severity, you’re most likely experiencing one of the symptoms of porn addiction.

This loss in concentration can wreck havoc on your career and skills especially if your work requires long bouts of uninterrupted concentration. Years ago, I used to write daily for up to five hours at a stretch. When my porn addiction was at its height, my writing deteriorated so much, that I quit my daily writing habit. It was just too hard to sit uninterrupted for an hour. I’ll be the first to admit that the writing on Quit Porn Get Girls is far from stellar, but I’m glad I’ve regained the ability to focus for longer periods of time.

2) Depression

Depression is a common all round symptom for all porn users. The funny thing is that you don’t even realize that those sudden random unexplained extreme drops in your mood are not normal. I always assumed my depression was due to some other aspect of my life- my lack of success with women, below average performance at work and school, or my childhood. As the days of no porn turned to weeks and eventually months, the dark cloud of depression which followed me everywhere slowly lifted till one day, I realized that I was just fine. No depression or deep sadness. I was back to what I could only describe as “normal”.

3) Lack of Romance

Exposure to pornography inevitably decreases how attractive you find your partner. Studies have shown that men and women feel less intimacy, less of a desire to perform sexually and loss of affection after frequent exposure to porn.

Contrary to the popular belief that porn helps relationships- continued use torpedoes your intimate relationship. If you are in your head all the time while having sex, there is no room for any sort of emotional connection, which forms the basis of intimate relationships.

4) Lack of Achievement

I honestly didn’t achieve jack shit when I was hooked on porn. I worked my ass of for years, and while I had modest, average results, there was nothing in my life that I truly excelled in. During the following months when I was completely off pornography, I achieved more than I had in several years- in literally all aspects of my life. My productivity was amazing, my business expanded rapidly, as did my interpersonal skills and my spiritual growth.

5) Low Energy

The difference between energy levels when you are on and off porn is like night and day. Off pornography, I am able to put in 18 hour workday including 2- 3 hours at the gym- everyday.

To avoid the risk of sounding like a drug advertisement, I’ll say this: Low energy can be due to many things- an underlying illness, adrenal fatigue, bad sleep cycle, etc. However, if you’ve made it to this symptom- you probably suspect that you may have a porn problem and low energy is common across the board for all porn addicts- especially if you use stimulants (redbull, coffee, Monster, etc) several times a day to stay sharp.

6) Erectile Dysfunction

The most dreaded of all symptoms. The inability to get it up during sex is one of the most emasculating and disturbing experiences a healthy man can experience. ED these days is much more prevalent among teenagers and men in their early to mid twenties. Most older men’s first exposure to porn was through magazines and catalogs. With the advent of high speed internet connections, many young men are experiencing ED earlier in life.

7) Premature Ejaculation:

Ejaculating too soon is usually due to training your brain over and over again to do so quickly or before you are fully erect. This usually starts when you are young with limited opportunities to masturbate. As a result, masturbation is quick. Fast forward a few years later, and its become a debilitating habit that shows up in your sexual encounters.

8) Unusual Porn Fetishes:

As any guy who has watched porn knows, it is fairly normal to progress from genre to genre of porn as your brain develops “tolerance” to your usual porn genre. Straight porn becomes boring, so you try lesbian, then interracial, transgender, BBW, MILF, Crossdressers …on and on. The shock and excitement of “taboo” sex causes you to orgasm. Unfortunately, each time to orgasm to one of these fetishes, you send a signal to your brain that says “ This feels good- its o.k…I’m cool with getting off on this.”

The most important thing I have to say here is this: The kind of porn you masturbate to is NOT an indicator of your sexual orientation. If you spent most of your life watching heterosexual pornography, then gradually switching to homosexual porn does not make you gay or “in the closet”.

I have spoken to gay men who, through repeated exposure to pornography began developing sexual attraction to females. It goes both ways.

Homosexual Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (HOCD) describes an obsession with ones sexuality- a persistent fear that you may have a different sexual orientation. Many men suffer from this in silence. Just remember: “You are not gay.”. More importantly, if you are struggling with this- I recommend seeking help from a licensed healthcare professional.

9) No attraction to real life partners:

Personally, this was the biggest indicator of a porn problem for me. As my porn use escalated, I completely lost all sexual interest in my partner. I still masturbated to porn, but I was simply not interested in sex with real life women.

These days, when I work with men on their dating skills, one of the tells that a guy may be addicted to porn is having a ridiculously high standard when it comes to women. Especially when he barely has any skills with women, and has few or no sexual partners.

10) Loss of Ability to orgasm during sex

This truly sucks. Experiencing a loss of ability to orgasm is usually a precursor to erectile dysfunction. There are several things that occur during the onset of this symptom such as a decrease in the sensitivity of your penis, sharp decline in sexual arousal with your regular sexual partners, development of strange fetishes and probably the most common: need to fantasize or imagine porn scenarios to maintain your erection.

What are some other symptoms of porn addiction that you’ve experienced?